Flight From Honour by Gavin Lyall Page A

Our civil servants were as petty-minded as any, of course, but nobody denied our value.”
    “But you were only spying on natives. We spy on gentlemen.”
    Dagner stopped dead in the middle of the pavement. “Is that a serious remark, Captain?‘”
    A bit surprised, Ranklin said: “Certainly it is. At the top levels, all European society’s intertwined. It isn’t just royalty marrying royalty, the aristocracy does it, too.”
    “Yes, I know all that. So—?” Dagner started walking again.
    “But also our politicians and diplomatists and top civil servants mostly spent a year at Heidelberg or the Sorbonne, and
their
top dogs were at Oxford or Cambridge for a while, and even if they don’t intermarry, they’re still in and out of each others’ houses for holidays and shooting-parties and the like. And they don’t like us spying on their cousins and old college chums.”
    He realised Dagner was giving him a steady and thorough stare. “And do you share that viewpoint, Captain?” he asked gently.
    Ranklin sighed. “It bothered me to start with. But as a Gunner I’m prepared to kill those people. Why should I jib at spying on them?”
    Perhaps that didn’t sound quite enthusiastic enough, because Dagner said gently: “I believe we belong to an honourable profession, Captain.”
    “We belong to a necessary one. I don’t know that honour comes into it.”
    Dagner might have been about to say more, but didn’t. Instead: “ I had a chat with O’Gilroy . . . It seems that this Italian senator wants to meet someone from the Bureau. What’s your feeling?”
    “I’d say Yes, he sounds intriguing. Would you like me to . . . ?”
    Dagner shook his head slowly. “No, I think I’ll call on him myself – he’s staying at the Ritz, I think? It’ll do me good to start meeting people in European politics . . . shan’t belong to the Bureau, of course, just be a civil servant in touch with them . . . D’you think a rumpled, tweedy academic sort? – no, an Italian probably wouldn’t get the point. Old-fashioned, frock-coat and topper? No, that wouldn’t be right for an Italian industrialist either. I think he’d talk most freely to someone brisk in a business suit. D’you agree?”
    Ranklin just mumbled, taken aback by the confident way Dagner had run through the parts he might play. It was a reminder that the man was a true professional, and that his ‘attitude’ might span both creeping up the Khyber Pass in a turban and calling at the Ritz in a business suit.
    With that decided, Dagner’s mind took a new turn. “About O’Gilroy . . . clearly you have no problem relying on a man with his . . . ah, background and connections.”
    Ranklin took a deep breath. “If you’re asking about his attitude, he believes in a free Ireland and isn’t going to stop. But the House of Commons believes that, too. It’s the Lords that’s blocking Home Rule. I’m not pretending O’Gilroy hasn’t done anything illegal in the past; I know damn well he has. But I’d guess it was mostly for the fun of it – and that’s really why he’s working for us now. And my only worry about his old friends, Fenians or whatever, is that they’ll kill him on sight. That’s why I’d rather we were sent to Europe again as soon as possible.”
    Dagner pondered this. “You don’t make his commitment to our cause sound very deep-rooted.”
    Ranklin shrugged. “If you asked O’Gilroy to stand up for the King and Empire I think he’d more likely fall off his chair laughing.” Dagner almost lost control of his expression; his face froze for a moment. Ranklin went on: “On the other hand, if I wanted somebody to guard my back in a dark alley I’d choose O’Gilroy any time. He’s. . . I’d say he’s loyal to the day,” he summed up. “Probably, by your standards, we’re both pretty incompetent. He doesn’t know foreign countries or languages, I don’t know how to survive in dark alleys. Together we may add